Symbolism refers to the use of symbols or images to represent abstract ideas or concepts. The Symbolist movement emerged in France in the late 19th century as artists and writers rejected Realism in favor of more subjective and ambiguous works that drew from emotions, dreams, and the spiritual psyche. Symbolists believed that art should represent absolute truths indirectly through metaphor and symbolism. Some precursors to Symbolism include Romanticism and works like Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du Mal, which developed an aesthetic of using symbols.
2. Symbolism means the systematic use of
symbols or pictorical conventions to express an
allegorical meaning.
The term is derived from the word
symbol which derives from the Latin
symbolum, a symbol of faith.
3. Movement
The symbolist movement emerged in France in
the second half of the nineteenth century. It was
based on ideas shared between both artist an
literary figures. Those ideas shared where a
rejection of Realism. Unlike their preceding
generation they saw arts as being subjective,
ambiguous and mysterious and instead of
looking outward into the world for their subject
matter, it came from their emotions, dreams and
spiritual psyche.
4. Movement
Symbolists believed that art should represent
absolute truth which could only be described
indirectly. Thus, They wrote in a very
metaphorical and suggestive manner, endowing
particular images or objects with symbolic
meaning.
Jean Moréas published Symbolist Manifesto in
the newspaper Le Figaro on 18th September
1886.
5. Movement
After the beginning of the 20th century, symbolism
had a major effect on Russian poetry even as it
become less popular in France.
Russian symbolism steeped in the second largest
christian denomination in the world the Easter
Orthodoxy and the religiuos doctrines of
Vladimir Solouyov, a Russian philosopher.
6. Precursors
Neoclassicism Romanticism Realism SYMBOLISM
1740-1830 1798-1832 1830-1870 1880-1900
Neo-classicism was a It was a revolt against The movement discarded
child of the Age of aristocratic social and the previous traditional
Reason (the political norms of the Age styles and formulas of
Enlightenment). They of Enlightenment and a Neoclassicism and
believed that strong reaction against the Romanticism. The Realist
drawing was rational, scientific rationalization artist portrays subjects in
therefore morally better. of nature. It was a general the most straightforward
They believed that art exaltation of emotion over manner possible without
should be cerebral, not reason and of the senses idealizing them, and
sensual. over intellect. without following previous
art theories.
7. Origins
Symbolist movement has its roots in Les Fleurs
du Mal (The Flowers of Evil) by Charles
Baudelaire.
The esthetic was developed during the 1860s an
70s and after the manifesto in the 1880s, the
symbolist movement attracted a generation of
writers.
8. Production of Symbolism
Symbolism was often produced trough allegory¹.
Allegory is the simpliest way of fleshing out a
theme, but it is also the least emotionally
satisfying because it makes things a little to easy
on the reader.
To take allegory to the next higher level we use
symbolism. At this level, there is still a form of
correspondence, and yet it is not so one-to-one,
and certainly not so obvious.
*Allegory: a story, play, picture, etc. in which each character or event is a symbol representing an idea or quality such as truth,
evil, death, etc.
9. Examples
• In the novel Animal Farm, the entire story is a
symbol for the evils of communism, with the
main animal characters representing key figures
in the Russian revolution. The novel can be read
entirely as a children’s story, but, when you
come to realize what the various elements and
characters in the story symbolize, the novel takes
a whole new meaning. That is why this particular
work has become such a classic. This kind of
story is called Allegory.
10. Examples
• In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Hamlet is fascinated
with actors and acting. His life has become
unreal; he is being haunted by the ghost of his
father, his father turns out to have been murder
by his uncle, his mother has married his father’s
murder.
The motif of the actors is a symbol for the
unreality of Hamlet’s life.
11. Examples
• In Hawthorne’s The Scarlet letter, the “A” that
Hester Prynne was forced to wear represented
not only that she was an adulteress, but also the
first letter of the name of her illegitimate child’s
father, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale.
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